1844.] SIR J. D. HOOKER'S REMINISCENCES. 387 



hope you will try to grudge as little as you can the trouble of 

 my letters, and pray believe me very truly yours, 



C. Darwin. 



P. S. I should feel extremely obliged for your kind offer 

 of the sketch of Humboldt ; I venerate him, and after having 

 had the pleasure of conversing with him in London, I shall 

 still more like to have any portrait of him. 



[What follows is quoted from Sir J. Hooker's notes. 



" The next act in the drama of our lives opens with per- 

 sonal intercourse. This began with an invitation to breakfast 

 with him at his brother's (Erasmus Darwin's) house in Park 

 Street ; which was shortly afterwards followed by an invita- 

 tion to Down to meet a few brother Naturalists. In the short 

 intervals of good health that followed the long illnesses which 

 oftentimes rendered life a burthen to him, between 1844 and 

 1847, I had many such invitations, and delightful they were. 

 A more hospitable and more attractive home under every 

 point of view could not be imagined — of Society there were 

 most often Dr. Falconer, Edward Forbes, Professor Bell, and 

 Mr. Waterhouse — there were long walks, romps with the 

 children on hands and knees, music that haunts me still. 

 Darwin's own hearty manner, hollow laugh, and thorough 

 enjoyment of home life with friends ; strolls with him all 

 together, and interviews with us one by one in his study, to 

 discuss questions in any branch of biological or physical 

 knowledge that we had followed ; and which I at any rate 

 always left with the feeling that I had imparted nothing and 

 carried away more than I could stagger under. Latterly, as 

 his health becamxC more seriously affected, I was for days and 

 weeks the only visitor, bringing my work with me and enjoy- 

 ing his society as opportunity offered. It was an established 

 rule that he every day pumped me, as he called it, for half 

 an hour or so after breakfast in his study, when he first 

 brought out a heap of slips with questions botanical, geo- 

 graphical, &c., for me to answer, and concluded by telling 



